Sixty-two decks were submitted to our deck-analysis tool. Fifty-nine of them came back with a complete review: a score out of ten on each of eleven criteria, with the strengths and weaknesses recorded per criterion. That adds up to 1,145 individual weaknesses and 1,011 strengths, across 26 pre-seed companies, 24 at seed and 5 at Series A, with a median raise of $800K.
We expected the scores to spread out. They didn't. The average was 69.9 out of 100 and the whole range sat between 55 and 75 — not one deck in the sample cleared 75. A ceiling that flat, across that many companies and stages, is not a coincidence about the companies. It's a pattern in how decks get built.
Every deck is strong in the same place, and thin in the same place
Averaged across all 59, the eleven criteria rank in an order that barely moves from deck to deck. Solution and value proposition scores 8.9 out of 10. Team scores 8.2. Problem scores 8.0. Then it falls away: traction 6.7, competitive landscape 6.7, financial projections 5.8, and exit strategy 5.0 — with 78% of decks scoring 5 or below on that last one.
Read that as a sequence and it maps directly onto the deck itself. The front is uniformly strong. The back is uniformly thin. Founders rehearse the story and run out of energy before the part that gets diligenced.
If your deck feels finished, check where you spent the hours. A polished first third and a rushed last third is the single most common shape in this sample — and it caps you around 70.
The problem slide is worth 0.13 points
Averages tell you what everyone does. To see what actually matters, we compared the top 15 decks against the bottom 15, criterion by criterion. The gaps are unambiguous:
- Financial projections — +1.80. The largest single differentiator in the sample.
- Exit strategy — +1.60.
- Traction and validation — +1.40.
- Business model and revenue — +1.40.
- Funding ask and use of funds — +1.27.
- Problem — +0.13. Solution — +0.07.
Those last two are the slides founders rewrite most often, and they carry essentially no discriminating power. Not because they don't matter — because everyone already does them well. A criterion where every deck scores 8 or 9 cannot tell a good company from a weak one, so it stops earning anything.
Another pass on your problem statement is measurably not worth it. The five blocks above are where a reviewer's opinion is actually formed.
Exit strategy is the cheapest unclaimed ground in fundraising
This is the clearest single finding in the dataset. Exit strategy averages 5.0 out of 10. Forty-six of 59 decks scored 5 or below. Not one deck scored above 7. Every deck in the sample had at least one weakness logged against it.
The recurring notes are almost interchangeable: no mention of potential acquisition targets, no comparable industry exits, no timeline, no path other than a stated ambition to IPO. An IPO alone reads as optimism rather than a plan, and reviewers say so in the same breath as they credit the ambition.
What closes it is not difficult. Name three plausible acquirers — actual companies, not "strategic buyers in the sector". Cite comparable exits in your category with multiples and dates. Give a realistic window, five to seven years, and say what has to be true by then. Show more than one path: M&A, secondary, or a PE rollup, not IPO alone.
No company in this sample scored above 7 here. A properly built exit slide is the closest thing to free points available, and almost nobody takes them.
A hockey stick with no visible driver reads as fiction
Financial projections score 5.8, and 31% of decks land at 5 or below. The most-repeated complaint across the whole corpus is missing assumptions — it appears in three quarters of decks. Break-even analysis is absent in roughly a third.
The distinction reviewers draw is between a number and a number you can interrogate. A revenue curve is a claim. Price times volume, with a conversion rate, a headcount plan and a churn figure underneath it, is an argument. Add the cost structure, a cash-flow view rather than top line alone, and the month you cross break-even.
You do not need better numbers. You need the assumptions visible under the numbers you already have — which is a formatting decision, not a business one.
Growth without retention is not traction
Traction averages 6.7, and the pattern behind that is specific. Retention and cohort data is missing in over half the decks. Named customers, case studies and testimonials are missing in a comparable share. Plenty of decks show a rising line of signups and nothing about whether those users stayed.
Reviewers consistently reward the concrete: named clients and partnerships, signed letters of intent, pilot results with an outcome attached, MRR with a date on it, month-over-month growth. They consistently mark down "strong early interest" with no number behind it.
If you show acquisition without retention, you have shown half a metric — and the missing half is the one that decides whether the first half means anything.
An ask is a number until it is tied to a milestone
Funding ask scores 6.8, and the gap is consistent: nearly half the decks have no milestones or KPIs attached to the money. The ask states an amount and, often, an equity percentage — then stops.
What scores is an allocation by category, a runway in months, and a named outcome the round buys. "This round takes us from $40K to $200K MRR and gives 18 months of runway" is the shape reviewers reward, because it converts a request into a testable claim.
An investor is not deciding whether to give you money. They are deciding what the money will have produced by the next round. Say it for them.
The seven gaps that cost the most
Counting how many of the 59 decks carry at least one logged weakness on each theme gives a short, blunt list. Exit strategy appears in every deck. Missing financial assumptions in 75%. Named competitor comparison in 73%. Customer-acquisition detail in 68%. Pricing in 66%. TAM/SAM/SOM with a stated methodology in 66%. Retention and cohort data in 53%.
Not one of these seven requires a new business result. Every one is a disclosure of something the founder already knows — which is why the 69.9 average is a ceiling on presentation, not on company quality.
Here's the uncomfortable part: the work sits in the least enjoyable part of the deck. Sourcing comparable exits, writing out your assumptions, pulling a cohort chart and naming the competitor you'd rather not name is unglamorous, and it lands at the end of the process when the deck already feels done. That's precisely why so few decks have it — and why the ones that do separate from the rest by a wide margin.
All eleven criteria, and what belongs in each
The Investor Deck Guide — every criterion from this analysis, what to include in each block, the seven gaps that cost the most points, and a slide order built from the findings.
✓ Here you go — open your guide →